Ken Carpenter came to Dartmouth from Medford, Oregon, in the summer of 1944 and then joined the U.S. Navy for 15 months before returning to receive his degrees from Dartmouth in 1949 and Thayer in 1950. He went to work in the San Francisco area and was programming test systems for Lockheed Martin before retiring in the early 1980s, when he and his wife, Barbara, moved to 12 acres in the hills outside of the unincorporated village of Honeydew in the northwest corner and the most undeveloped portion of the California coast. Honeydew is only a spot on the map with a general store and post office, one house and an elementary school. Residents live in the surrounding hills. The climate is remarkable. The village is in the Mattole River valley, where temperatures typically reach the upper 90s in mid-summer and mid-50s in the winter, with annual rainfall of 100 inches. While only 15 miles from the Pacific Ocean, it is on the eastern edge of the King Range, which has 4,000-foot peaks. Ken is quite self-sufficient. He is off the power grid and gets his electricity from solar panels, supplemented by a gas generator, has a Vermont Casting wood stove as a primary heating source, purchases local produce, favors organic and avoids genetically modified foods and watches no TV. He is very active on the Internet and was working on two computers when I called. He likes where he’s living, despite “an occasional forest fire, earthquake and rattlesnake.” He adds, “Then there are the pot farmers dotting the landscape with their greenhouses.” Now a widower, Ken’s not reclusive and is treasurer of the Mattole Grange, near Petrolia, where he is past treasurer of the local community center. John Hatheway advises that the mini-reunion is scheduled for September 23 and 24. You should have more information by the time you read this column, but give me or John a call if you have questions. John recently attended a Williams-Wesleyan double-header, where his grandson, Kollen Hatheway, the Williams shortstop, hit a home run in the last inning to win the first game and another to start the second. Grandchildren are fun.

—Dave Kurr, 4281 Indian Field Road, Clinton, NY 13323; (315) 853-3582; djkurr@verizon.net